[LINK] Dealing with Your IAP

[Roger Clarke]

>On 18/04/2012 4:20 PM, Roger Clarke wrote:
>>  ...
>>  You really do have to wonder about the design of helpdesk systems ...
>>  ...

At 20:39 +1000 18/4/12, David Boxall wrote:
>Like most commercial systems, "help" desks are designed to, as cheaply
>as possible, give the appearance of providing a service. Faced with
>anything remotely approaching what you experienced, most users would
>give up. For the "provider", that's cheap.

It also means that $50 x 12 = $600 p.a. of revenue (which has been 
all-but maintenance-free for all-but 7 years) walks out the door.

To be fair:
(a)  I sent a customised version of my post to the TPG CEO
(b)  I had an email from Customer Support, and a phone-call from a
      senior engineer, both within an hour
(c)  the engineer confirmed that it was as I'd imagined - basically
      a routing table must somehow have had a <null> entry in it, but
      finding out why would cost far too much effort to be worth chasing
      down.  They changed some entries, and I think they're actually
      retiring the device tomorrow
(d)  (they say that) they're reviewing the procedures that resulted in
      it taking about 31 hours longer to fix than it needed to


-- 
Roger Clarke                                 http://www.rogerclarke.com/

Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd      78 Sidaway St, Chapman ACT 2611 AUSTRALIA
                    Tel: +61 2 6288 1472, and 6288 6916
mailto:Roger.Clarke at xamax.com.au                http://www.xamax.com.au/

Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Law               University of NSW
Visiting Professor in Computer Science    Australian National University